Where There Is Smoke
by ectograsp
Summary: Peace doesn't last. This is the story of Al and his two best friends, who witness the starting shot of the next war. This is the story of what follows.


_It couldn't last forever. _

_Harry knew that; had always known it, though he'd sometimes let himself forget. Peace was no permanent thing. People would go on starting wars and ending them for as long as the human race existed._

_He had hoped the next war would skip his children's generation, though. _

'_We're keeping them out of it,' Ginny had said firmly, when he'd confirmed what they'd suspected for months. 'They're not to be involved.'_

'_You and I know better than anyone that kids can't be kept apart from war.'_

'_It's not a war yet.'_

'_It will be.'_

_July 21 3:14pm_

Lying in his bedroom, wearing a pair of jeans and nothing else, smoking his third cigarette of the afternoon and trying not to succumb to sullenness, was Albus Potter.

Summer was well and good when you had your mates to hang out with, but Scorpius – the traitor – had delayed his plans to come stay at the Potters' till the very last week. Something to do with his parents – _Sorry mate, but Dad's going to need my help round the house this summer - _which, in Scorpius's case, was ominous. He couldn't really be blamed, but it was disappointing. At least he wrote, though – Lily liked to tease him that they were like parted lovers, sending flurries of letters at all hours of the day – but Emma, who never arrived to stay until the last week as a rule, was hopeless when it came to that. He'd had one note from her – one, after three loquacious and delicately pressing letters – which had thanked him for his correspondence – and then his concern – but explained that living with Muggle foster parents, not to mention four younger foster siblings (as well as working two jobs) kept her so busy that she didn't have much time to properly write. There was also the matter of hiding the owl – he got the impression from her hints that Griggs, the nine year old, had a bit of a history with animals and fire.

So he had resigned himself to a summer of letters from only one of his two best friends, and to spending a whole lot of time with his family. Which wasn't exactly a hardship, he had excellent parents and a sister who was thirteen going on forty and therefore great for a chat – and there was James, who – pillock though he may be – was always up for a bit of Quidditch, rain or shine. He took great delight in proving himself the superior player – which he'd better be, as he was about to start on the Puddlemere reserve team – while Al only cared about being slightly better than everyone at Hogwarts, which he already was; practicing with James was just maintenance.

There were frequent visits from Teddy, as well as outings; there was an army of Weasleys to hang out with, and several decent year-mates only an owl's length away. He enjoyed all of them hugely. But he missed his best mates. There were things you just couldn't do with people who were not them – he couldn't go flying in the Cliffs without them (because they'd kill him, and they'd spot the lie in a second); he couldn't rob Honeydukes' cellar without them (literally; Emma had _taken possession_ of the invisibility cloak 'for your own good, until you can be trusted with it again' after she'd run smack into him outside the prefects bathroom where Meredith Rothfuss happened to be). It was no fun to go to Diagon Alley without them, so he'd been putting off buying his school stuff – even bumming around his house and grounds got boring without Scorpius's constant ribbing and Emma's talent for mad ideas.

There was a level of understanding, too, that was just missing with everyone else. The other night at dinner, he'd kept widening his eyes at Lily to kick James under the table as he kept on asking Dad – who clearly wasn't in the right mood – about the neo-Death Eaters in the paper. It's not like Scorpius would have done it, Scorpius liked James – Emma would've – but they both would have known what he meant.

He was glum without them, was all. Morose. Gloomy. Sad. Depre –

' – stop bloody _sulking, _would you?'

There was a loud bang as thirteen year old Lily Potter shoved open her brother's bedroom door and strode inside, looking completely unimpressed.

'Merlin, Lily, knock!' Al yelped.

'Excuse me for thinking you above lying naked on your bed at three in the afternoon.'

'I could have been changing.'

'Yes, 'changing'. James happens to have passed on to me that he has anecdotal proof you do your 'changing' in the downstairs bathroom.'

He blushed; James was a dead man. What he was thinking, talking about wanking in front of their sister…

'Moving on from that,' she glared at him, and Al shuffled so he was sitting up on his bed instead of lying on it, feeling a bit like he was being scolded by his mother; 'you're being a pain. Rose told Hugo who told me you wouldn't go to Fortescue's with her this morning; said you had a breakfast date. Which is obviously not true.'

'I could have a breakfast date!' he argued.

'I'd meant because I know you haven't left your room. I saw the toast you summoned flying up the stairs this morning. But no you could not have a breakfast date. You are currently a lazy, anti-social bore.'

'Ouch,' he grumbled, feeling slightly hurt – Lily must have detected this because a flicker of guilt crossed her face and she opened her mouth, possibly to recant – but he waved her silent. 'No, you're a bit right. Only I didn't not go out with Rose because of the anti-socialness or the laziness. Rose requires a certain mind frame, and I'm not in it.'

'Mmm, fair enough,' smiled Lily, who knew better than most their cousin Rose's acidic nature – Rose inexplicably hated Lily, always had, with such historical consistency that Lily seemed to mind it no more than if she were a cat that didn't want to be petted. 'But you should really get out of your room.'

'Possibly,' he admitted. 'Don't know why you mind so much.'

'I'm a lovely person who is concerned for your wellbeing.'

'Try again.'

'That happens to be true, but I also want to go to Hogsmeade and you know I'm not allowed to on my own.'

Al groaned. 'Do I have to?'

'No.'

'But now I'll feel bad if I don't.'

'I can't help that.' Lily said this with all the pleased serenity of someone who had already gotten her way. Which was kind of Lily's usual tone, come to think of it.

'Go with James?'

'James actually does have a date,' Lily grinned, and they both laughed.

'Who's the poor girl?'

'He said her name was Poppy but it's Posy, I've seen her in the society pages.'

'Did you correct him?'

'I'm hoping she throws her drink in his face,' she said gleefully.

Lily and Al both liked James, really – Lily certainly did, and Al had spent enough time with him this summer to recognize a moment of non-violent feeling towards him when it flew by – but they also found it better to let his obnoxiousness play out rather than directing him along a more tactful path, hoping that he'd learn his lesson. If this method had been unsuccessful thus far in their careers as his siblings, and if it was funny to watch him go – that was incidental. They'd help him out if he ever got into any real trouble.

'So… Hogsmeade?'

Al sighed dramatically, stamping out his cigarette in the ashtray on his bedside table. 'Alright. I'll come. But you're buying me a Butterbeer, moneybags.'

Family rumour had it that Lily, who had saved every Knut she ever got in her whole life, was actually richer than their father. Al knew this was bull. He also knew she had more money than him.

Lily nodded. 'Deal.'

Getting up – in the slowest, most laborious manner he could manage, just to really impart on her the effort he was going to for her, here – Al cast his eyes around for a clean shirt. The two on his floor were dirty. The one slung over his desk chair, also dirty. The jumper on the end of his bed… he picked it up and sniffed it; you could barely tell it had been worn at all. Satisfied, he pulled it over his head.

'Classy,' Lily remarked dryly.

'I come as myself or I don't come at all,' he joked. 'Slightly sweaty and smoky at all times.'

'Oh, gross.'

He started to walk out of the room, picking up a jacket on the way out, when she said, 'I know you're disappointed they couldn't come sooner.'

He paused. 'Oh, I… I don't mind that much. They'll be here in a few days.'

'But you're used to having Scorpius for at least a month. And it's always tough with Emma, she's so unreachable over the holidays. I know you miss her.'

There was something odd about her tone, like she was trying to say something rather more with it.

'I miss both of them,' he reminded her, because people often tried to imply things about he and Emma; things that weren't true. His own sister should certainly know that.

She rolled her eyes; smiled; let it go. 'Okay.'

_Approximately Ten Hours Ago_

_July 21 5:00am_

'No! Fuck! Argh!'

Emma Wells had woken up this morning to the sound of her alarm – that was normal. What wasn't normal was the owl sitting on her chest.

_People just would not learn not to write to her. _

Because there was absolutely no privacy in this house, and any second now –

'EMMA!'

The door flew open and Emma, in the space of about three seconds, executed a series of ill-advised actions – wrapping her arms around the owl, clenching it to her chest (it squawked and bit her collarbone), and rolling off her bed and onto the floor. This was ill advised for several reasons; the nature of owls, the hardness of floorboards and the fact that she was wearing no top.

'Ow…'

'Stupid bint, what on earth –'

'Don't walk round, I'm naked!' she squeaked, as the creaking of Sarah's footsteps alerted her to her foster mother's intention. The owl wriggled indignantly against her chest; luckily Emma had landed on her elbows and not her front – she'd only just realized she could have killed it.

'What was all the swearing about? I'm trying to sleep!'

'I had a nightmare, alright?'

She could hear Sarah's teeth grinding; there was a tense moment of silence, in which Emma could practically feel the waves of irritation – and then, blessedly, there was the sound of footsteps in the other direction. A second later, the door slammed, and Sarah was gone.

'Bloody hell…'

Emma immediately released the owl and it sprung from her chest like a ball from a cannon; she realized with remorse that this was none other than Floss, Scorpius's owl – a gorgeous brown tawny with the sweetest disposition of any bird known to man, who had always trusted Emma – always come to her or Al if she was unable to find her owner, always found them in the Owlery and volunteered to take their letters if she was not already busy – and was now perched on the back of her armchair, looking more hurt than frightened. She'd clearly expected a better greeting. Emma felt guilt clench in her stomach.

'Oh, sweetheart…'

She picked herself up off the ground, quickly grabbed a singlet off her bed and pulled it on, then approached Floss with her very best expression of contrition – she didn't have to try, really. Floss's feathers, usually sleek and perfect, had been tugged in several places, giving her a dishevelled look – one single, beautiful wing feather lay on the ground. Emma felt awful.

'I'm very sorry,' she said, reaching out to stroke the owl's head. There was a chance Floss might bite her, but she figured it was probably her right. 'I had a shock. I didn't mean to hurt you. I was actually trying to protect you. Around here, owls are dinner.'

Floss let her head be administered to, but there was definitely a hint of scepticism in those owl eyes.

'Don't believe me?' Emma grinned. 'I should introduce you to Griggs. He'd try to make you into owl ice cream and I'd have to rescue you all over again.'

She could see the moment Floss decided to forgive her; she scratched Emma's finger affectionately with her beak, and then held out her leg; she had a message.

'Thank you very much,' said Emma seriously, and she took the envelope, opening it and recognizing Scorpius's miniscule anal-retentive print. For fuck's sake, he'd ruled a margin.

_Dear Emma,_

_I got a letter from Lily last night – think she thought it'd be a bit pointless trying you, you busy isolationist git – and apparently Al is a total mess without us. I'd suspected as much; his letters have been fairly passive aggressive. Bored out of his mind, missing us terribly, weeping, tearing his hair – it's no surprise really, we always knew he was in love with me, and I reckon he's got a soft spot for you too. I'll be able to get away from home for a few hours at least tonight, and the plan is to meet up at the Leaky Cauldron around five and surprise him – Lily's gonna get him there somehow. Now I know you have responsibilities at home – such is your vague disclaimer every time we try to bully you into meeting up over the summer or you know, writing more than a paragraph in the space of three months – and it's entirely possible you have a shift lined up or something like it. But come on, Emma. You only live once. I know we'll all be together at the Potters' in a week anyway but tonight will be a laugh. And he won't be half as happy if you're not there. Swap a shift. Phone in sick. I'm calling in a favour._

_Scorpius_

Oh, but he was brilliant.

It wasn't as though she _wanted _to miss out on seeing her friends for three whole months. It wasn't as if hearing stories of what Al and Scorpius did at the Potters' during the weeks before she got there didn't make her insanely jealous. It wasn't as though she didn't like getting letters, or didn't want to reply to them.

She was just genuinely so busy that she could never eke out a bit of time (let alone find a place) that was really safe for owls to arrive – she hadn't been joking about Griggs. She loved that boy like a little brother but he was in therapy for anger management after killing a cat and she wouldn't trust him with an ant farm, let alone an owl. Archie, just a year younger than her, knew all about magic – Archie could be trusted – but as he was in a wheelchair, he couldn't be rushing around after a bird. Erica was only eight and absolutely terrible with secrets; even if she thought owl traffic was just some interesting aspect of London wildlife, she'd chatter about them nonstop and that would draw the attention of the others. Liam was three and therefore not really a danger, but not exactly helpful either. And her foster parents were out of the question – Sarah thought birds were vermin and Darren was a psychopath, so both were likely to throw bricks at any owls they saw around the house.

There was also what Darren had done to Clocks.

Emma just didn't want her friends' pets to _die. _Floss was one thing, too – quiet and obedient and trained by Scorpius to be discreet (though it was chancy even for her) – but Al's owl Pythagoras was loud, restless, the size of a large cat and prone to bouts of temper during which he would neither relinquish letters nor carry them without a hefty bribe of dead mice, which were in short supply on McGregor Street and could well have necessitated she keep him for days.

Then there was the matter of work, which kept her from getting away to Diagon Alley or Hogsmeade. She got up at five am every weekday, showered, dressed, fed the kids breakfast and then caught the bus to Adler's where she waitressed until five in the afternoon. The kids got free dinner at the café and then most nights she walked straight over to Burnt Down, the pub around the corner where she tended bar. Both her bosses were friends of hers – they wouldn't begrudge her sick days or time off – but she needed the money.

See, but Scorpius was pressing all her buttons.

She knew Al was prone to sulking, but she also knew Scorpius loathed being shut up in his house, and that she herself could not wait to go to the Potters' in a week's time and see them again – Al was no more disgruntled than the two of them, though he was perhaps worse at hiding it – he wore his heart on his sleeve – made him absolutely shit at poker. This note was just waxing on about how _happy _Al would be to see her and what a _mess _he'd been without his friends (though Scorpius meant for her to take that purely in the context of herself) because Scorpius wanted her to think that what Al wanted, more than the three of them being together again, was to see Emma (she wished). He thought that might be just the thing to get her to drop whatever she was doing and break her streak of abstentia.

Honestly. She'd kept the secret of how she felt about Al since third year and with one drunken confession it all fell to pot. She'd asked him not to bring it up again and he hadn't, but he'd not stopped referencing it backhandedly.

_Thin ice, mate. Keep up with the obscure mentions and I'll 'obscurely' mention your collection of female Quidditch player porn and the fact that it features Al's mother._

Only she did want to go.

She felt guilty, though – she left Archie here year round to look after the kids on his own, scrounging up money from whatever he and his mates could steal off the backs of vans, selling test scores and working minimum wage after school at a data entry institute. The least she could do was work a solid two months and three weeks; Archie had always insisted she take at least a week for herself to go to the Potters' at the end; that was luxury enough.

_Tap tap._

Someone was knocking on her door.

'Come in, Archie!' Emma yelled. It had to be him – he was the only one in the whole house who bothered to knock at all. She'd feel guilty for scarring Griggs with the sight of her bare breasts if it weren't for the fact that he'd brought it on himself by barging into her room to demand she tell him where she'd hidden his crowbar.

The door opened somewhat more decorously than it had earlier, and Archie – still in his pajamas, but having jammed his glasses slightly crookedly onto his face to come and see her – entered. Looking amused.

'It was an owl, wasn't it.'

She sighed. 'My friends are incorrigible. They have no respect for the violent impulses of nine year olds.'

'Griggs is hardly your run-of-the-mill nine year old. He's more like a demon in human form – wait, are there demons?'

'Depends who you ask,' Emma smirked. 'Two years ago Felix Vasquez suddenly gained the ability to speak Gobbledegook and started drinking ink; he got sent to St Mungo's and woke up one day unexplainably cured. Professor Kane thought he'd been possessed by a demon but Professor Baubrey said it was a side effect of scrawniness, excessive consumption of chips, and perving on middle aged ladies through upstairs windows.'

'You're hilarious,' deadpanned Archie; who was seventy kilos soaking wet, ate nothing but chips and spent his free time spying on their forty year old next door neighbour, Mrs Fennel, who liked to do bouncy exercise routines in her underwear with the curtains open. 'What was the letter about?'

'Usual stuff. Catching up.'

'You forbade your lot from writing you, they wouldn't have ignored that for no good reason.'

Archie had never met her best mates and was presuming a level of obedience she wasn't sure they were capable of, but it didn't seem worth it to argue.

'They… Scorpius wants me to go meet him and Al – and Al's little sister – at a pub.'

'Excellent. Have fun.'

'I – I can't go!'

'Emma, Jesus Christ. Get a life. We can do without a day's worth of minimum wage. To be quite honest, you make me feel a bit of a slacker. It's not as though I spend all year while you're not here in the mines – I steal, do tests for idiots and press buttons on a computer. I have plenty of time for the pub.'

This was true; Emma knew that. She knew that Archie in fact got a kick out of being thrifty; that it gave him a sense of pride to provide for the little kids and a vicious satisfaction to wear new clothes and eat quality lunches in front of Darren and Sarah, who survived off five kids' worth of foster allowances and still had patches in their clothes and ate cold beans for breakfast because they were so bad with the money. Archie was the kids' hero; he showed up with a face full of stubble for parent teacher interviews and cried ableism to anyone who cast doubt on his paternal status – he raised cash for haircuts and school excursions and birthday cakes – he convinced the principal not to expel Griggs after he kicked a little boy in the stomach – he dropped off Erica's lunch and ran over the feet of the girls who called her fat with his wheelchair. He was their brother, their father and their knight in shining armour – something he managed to be even while frequenting pubs, clubs and mates' houses.

But Archie had all year to be the kids' hero. Emma was like the aunt who visited every summer; they liked her, loved her even, but knew that it was the year-rounder they had to thank for the roof over their heads and the clothes on their backs. It was him they went to if they were upset or in trouble. These kids were her family. Every day she spent with them was a desperate attempt to make them remember her while she was gone; to think of her as something other than the one who mostly wasn't there. She didn't exactly have any blood relations to count on.

Archie gave her a pitying look and she scowled. They'd been together since they were nine and ten respectively; he knew exactly why she buried herself headfirst in the shit storm that was McGregor Street every time summer rolled around. He knew she didn't want to stop belonging there.

'It'll be fine,' he said firmly. 'I'll take the kids to Adler's for dinner and you can see them on your way out.' He squinted at something over her shoulder. 'It's five twenty – your shift starts in under an hour –'

Emma whirled around to look at her alarm clock.

'Fuck!'

She started scrambling for her hideous red waitress outfit – she was sure she'd put it over her chair – no, wait, on the dresser.

'So are you gonna go?'

Scorpius knew her too well – she sighed.

'Yeah. I'm gonna go.'

Shopping with Lily was a test of patience.

Not only was she the kind of discerning shopper that read the nutritional information on the packets of everything in Honeydukes and interrogated the poor shopgirl in Zonko's about the testing processes of their products, but she insisted on going to Madam Puddifoot's and ordering the soufflé, which took a whole forty minutes to bake. By the time she took her last miniscule bite, Al was ready to throttle her. It was five' o clock. He'd been prepared to do a good deed as her brother – take her out for a drink and a quick walk through the streets – but honestly, this was pushing it, and Lily was smart enough to know that it would get him cross. Judging by the smile he saw on her face whenever she thought he wasn't looking, she didn't care – she thought it was _funny._

Right. Well, she could make up for it in Butterbeer. Forget one, she was forking it over for at _least _three.

They'd started the walk up to The Three Broomsticks – Al carrying his sister's bags, because he was a gentleman, dammit – and the bint _would not hurry up._

'My foot hurts,' she complained, when he threw her a look of pure loathing. 'I think these shoes are giving me blisters.'

'Lily, you can make it the hundred feet at a pace _slightly _faster than a Niffler walking away from gold.'

'They'll bleed,' she sniffed.

'I don't think you understand. If I don't get a Butterbeer in the next thirty seconds, I'm going to combust. You know how I feel about shopping.'

'I know you have a ridiculous misogynistic prejudice against shopping, yes.'

'It's not misogynistic,' he protested, genuinely offended. 'I like lots of girly things. Emma nearly strangled me last year for nicking her Jane Austens without asking. I just hate shopping.'

'Shopping isn't even girly; Hugo loves it. You're just a baby,' she grumbled.

'Says the girl limping because of a _blister.'_

'You know what, if you want to go faster, you can give me a piggy back.'

Al looked at her in disbelief. 'You're not serious. I'm already carrying your bags.'

'You don't have to let go of them, I'll hold on by myself.'

'Oh – fine,' he snapped, trying to sound scathing. 'I can't believe a single girl can be so patronizing and yet so childish.'

Lily appeared absolutely gleeful as she wheeled round and climbed onto his back. Luckily she was very small for her age and weighed about as much as a Quaffle and a half; Al legged it towards the pub and shouldered open the door with relief.

The Three Broomsticks was one of his favourite places in the world. Warm, well-lit and stocked with the best sticky date pudding known to mankind, he knew all the wait staff by name from frequenting the place ever since he was a kid – and it was always pleasantly full and noisy in a cheerful, homey sort of way. What's more, it was such a Hogwarts staple that he could practically count on running into someone he knew – it would be too much to hope for Meredith Rothfuss, but he'd welcome the sight of any of his year-mates: hanging round with Lily all afternoon had reminded him that much as he adored the prat, it was nice to spend time with people who saw you as an equal instead of an indentured monkey.

Lily slid off his back and inched round to face him, finally grabbing her bags out of his hands.

'I'll find us a table then, shall I?' he suggested, and peered around – there didn't seem to be any empty, though someone was sitting alone in one of the four-seaters, which seemed a bit unfair. Some blonde tosser who – wait…

Al narrowed his eyes – that was a _familiar _blonde tosser.

'Lily,' he said slowly; 'That's Scorpius, there.'

'Yep.'

'You knew he was coming.'

'I might have invited him.'

'But he's been busy all summer.'

'I might have _convinced _him.'

She said this with such pride that Al completely forgave her for the mind-numbing trip to Honeydukes and the embarrassment of Zonko's and the piggy-back ride, and said ruefully; 'You're lovely after all.'

She shrugged, but a blush stained her cheeks. 'You're such a downer without them, I thought I'd save us all a bit of agony and get you together. Now go say hi and I'll order drinks – you're paying, by the way, because on balance I think you owe _me _now.'

Meh.

Lily sidled off to the counter and Al marched over to the table where lounged Scorpius Malfoy – six feet two, beady eyed and proprietor of the most clichéd set of English teeth known to man. Birds seemed to think he was handsome – Al just thought he was entertaining.

'Hello!' he grinned, sliding into the seat opposite him.

'Well if it isn't _Potter,' _said Scorpius, doing his best impression of the way his father spoke about Al's – it was ruined somewhat by the smile tugging at the corner of his mouth – Al sniggered.

'Look at this,' he said, reaching out and tugging his friend's collar. 'Buttons done all the way to the top – are you wearing cufflinks? It's a weekend, you freak. There are girls here.'

Scorpius glared at him. 'Girls are hardly complaining about my fashion sense.'

'No, but when you open your mouth and start stammering about Hippogriff mating rituals like in fourth, they start weighing up how much time they'll have to spend getting you out of your kit while you run your mouth.'

Scorpius tried to look angry at this, but failed. He was hopeless with girls – he either treated them like a prospective business partner, lots of 'respectfully, miss' and 'let's discuss that, shall we' – or the possibility of sex smacked him in the face like a dirty wet dishcloth and he babbled incoherently about nonsense until they either kissed him or walked away in disgust. Luckily Scorpius was not too proud to have the mickey taken out of him for this or their friendship would have been demolished ages ago –he admitted freely that while he was widely known as the subject of female fantasy, he was also the master of chopping those fantasies up into tiny little bits with just a dose of reality.

Scorpius was ace to make fun of – he may blush and stammer and narrow his eyes if he was really pissed, but he never got truly angry, and usually gave as good as he got.

'I've missed you, mate.' Al meant it to come off as a joke, but it ended up sounding quite genuine and Scorpius tilted his head bashfully.

'Missed you too, gorgeous.'

The thing was – Al was not a total basketcase. He could survive a few months without his friends. He just didn't like to.

'Sorry I couldn't come round any earlier,' Scorpius continued, a bit more seriously. 'My dad wanted my help with – of all things – the house elves.'

'What?'

'Yeah, well he's finally been given permission to have some again from the Ministry but a lot of them aren't too keen to work for him, let alone in the Manor – so he's had me interview them, train them, gradually introduce them to him so I can reassure them he's not going to cut their heads off and they'll actually believe me.'

'Why is it so important to your dad to have house elves?' asked Al, who privately thought that Mr Malfoy, though reformed and reputably harmless, probably shouldn't be left alone with creatures that were magically subservient to him.

'It's a bit of a pride thing – Malfoys have always had them, and he doesn't like being responsible for the housecleaning himself – but I think it's also to prove to himself that he's different, you know – prove it to other people as well, when the Society for the Protection of Elfish Welfare doesn't get called to intervene like everyone expects.'

'Oh, well – good on him. Providing jobs and all that,' said Al, commenting on the part he could actually get behind. 'Is that all you've been up to?'

Scorpius took a deep breath. 'I've had a few letters from Rose.'

'Oh Merlin.'

Rose had had a crush on Scorpius since their first year at Hogwarts; up until last year, everyone had let Rose believe that it was a secret, because Scorpius had yet to work it out. When they were partnered together for a potions project, Rose – who, though striking to look at and blisteringly intelligent, had the personality of an enraged harpy – turned on the small reservoir of charm at her disposal and managed to convince Scorpius that she was a decent mate. At first she'd been thrilled – several people had reported seeing her smile in the hallways – but when she tried to kiss him in the library, a gobsmacked Scorpius had told her a little too frankly that he didn't see her that way – not romantically – not as a _girl, _per se – and she'd cursed his fingers off. Rose had spent the last month of school stomping and snapping at people for leaving their shoelaces untied. Scorpius had spent that month in hiding.

Al winced. 'What did she, uh… what did she have to say?'

'She apologized for the fingers… '

'So she should.'

'And so I sent a letter back, apologizing for the 'not really a girl' comment. She seemed to take the apology as a retraction of sentiment and her second letter was definitively hopeful.'

Scorpius had started to peel the label off his Butterbeer, something he only did when he felt anxious. Al couldn't entirely blame Rose for flying off the handle – it was never nice to be rejected, let alone told by the object of your affection that you didn't really qualify as your own gender in their eyes (he'd given Scorpius a talking to) – but he also knew that Scorpius had been genuinely sad about losing the friendship, and that it had been more a shocked lack of tact that led him to say what he did than any outright viciousness.

'School's going to be interesting then –' he started to say, but Lily had squeezed into the seat next to him and Scorpius widened his eyes urgently, swiping his hand across his throat in the universal sign for _shut up. _Not a conversation for Lily, then.

'You two having fun catching up?' asked Lily happily.

'I'm delirious with joy,' Scorpius replied solemnly.

Seeing his sister's face again, Al suddenly remembered something. 'Hey, Lily – you said them – you're such a downer without _them – _is Emma coming?'

Lily glanced at Scorpius, who grimaced.

'Sorry, mate. I wrote to her, but you know her – I've heard nothing back. I'm sure she'd be here if she could.'

'Yeah.' Al hadn't really expected her, but he'd thought he may as well ask – and he couldn't help but be disappointed. He was stoked to see Scorpius again, but in a way it made him miss Emma more. It was always best when it was the three of them. He worried more about her, too – daft as it sounded, at least he knew Scorpius had his parents looking out for him and a big bank account to fall back on. Emma never really said anything, but it was fairly obvious her foster parents were useless, and it had always been clear she didn't have much money. Not to mention, he'd looked up McGregor Street in a Muggle internet café once – the crime rate in that area was outlandish and Emma lived with Muggles, she wasn't allowed to use magic.

It would be nice to know she was doing alright, was all.

He'd been digging his thumbnail into a groove on the wooden table top; looking up, he caught Lily and Scorpius exchanging an odd look. He decided to ignore it.

'So, Scorpius – did you get this month's Quibbler? How 'bout that article on that Norwegian school that got closed down because of a Wrackspurt infestation?'

Emma was late.

First she'd spilled coffee down her front, to which the logical Muggle response, enacted within eyesight of her logical Muggle boss, was to run her shirt under cold water and scrub it down with soap and then _dry it under the hand blower. _Then the kids had arrived for dinner and she'd had to help Erica find the only thing she liked, 'the yellow thing with the stuff', on the menu. After that she'd gotten hurriedly changed in the bathroom, rushed out of the café to find a nice quiet bit of street on which to hail the Knight Bus, and promptly had a cigarette flicked into her hair by a careless half-drunk newspaper vendor who felt so bad that his apology was cut short at eight minutes.

By the time she got off the bus at Hogsmeade, it was a quarter to six. She wasn't pleased about being late, but she felt something warm and light flare up in her stomach at the sight of the honey-lit windows of The Three Broomsticks – her friends were inside.

She pushed open the door, and immediately heard his voice.

' – and then she slapped him.'

'Ha! And this was – _Lucia, _right –'

'Lucinda.'

'Wasn't there a Lucia?'

'Yeah, but he didn't even get a drink in her hand before _she_ left.'

'Your brother's a scoundrel.'

'He's mentally deficient, is what he is.'

Emma chuckled quietly. If there was one reliable way to track down Al in a crowded room, it was to listen for people mocking James.

A throng of teenage girls moved out of her eye-line and she spotted them immediately – Scorpius's head and shoulders, blonde and well-postured; little Lily Potter, her red hair neatly plaited and tied with a bow, those shrewd eyes twinkling; and Al – handsome, bespectacled and owner of the best shoulders and most anomalous hair of Hogwarts. He grinned at something Scorpius was saying and Emma grinned in response, she couldn't help it – her stomach did a weird flip-flop thing.

_So it's still like that, then._

She'd hoped a summer apart would cure her of being in love with Al. But then, she'd hoped that every summer since third year – why should this one be any different? It would be brilliant to go back to normal – the normal that had existed when they were twelve years old, when he'd been a skinny specky pain in the bum; friend yes, but romantic interest? Absolutely not. Sometime in their third year, she'd realized she felt very differently about Al than she did Scorpius; that she liked looking at him, in fact didn't realize she was doing it half the time, and certainly couldn't make herself stop. She found herself playing over things he'd said when she was trying to sleep, because she liked the sound of his voice. Whenever he touched her she was completely present and aware of her skin. And she was never, ever happier than when she was with him; never happier than when he was laughing, or when he said something stunning that was meant as nothing more than an affirmation of friendship (because she knew, with a certainty that really helped, that he did love her as a friend), but which she kept as a kind of lightning bug memory, holding it close and bringing it out when she needed cheering up. Whether it meant what she wanted it to or not.

She was a pathetic bastard, was the gist of it. And probably really needed to get laid.

Shrugging out of her jacket, Emma walked over to the table. Lily was the first one to see her, and she nudged Al in the ribs.

' – not that she had anything close to the one on Hera Madden, but – oi!' Al glanced at her indignantly. 'What was that for?'

Lily pointed, and the boys looked.

Scorpius's mouth dropped open and Emma lifted her chin smugly – he'd obviously assumed she wasn't coming.

Al's face cracked with a completely gorgeous smile _(oh Emma, shut up with this gorgeous smile malarkey. You're not helping yourself)_. 'What the hell? Emma!'

He practically kicked Lily out of the booth so he could get up, and Emma felt her usual panic-joy kick in as he bounded over to give her a hug, wrapping his arms around her waist and holding her against his chest and smiling into her hair and bugger, bugger, _bugger. _He was doing the thumb thing. The rubbing her back with his thumb thing. _Why does he have to be so good at hugs. _He even smelled good and she knew him – ten to one he was wearing a dirty shirt. _What kind of malicious creature smells good in a dirty shirt. _He was warm and everything. Just… fuck him, was what.

'Good to see you, too,' she croaked.

He pulled away, laughing, and Emma mentally attacked with rocket launchers the insipid girl inside her who started to complain.

'I'm excited. This is a day to remember. Emma Wells going off book! It's like being back at Hogwarts. Only with a little more Lily.'

'I'm glad to see you too,' said Scorpius loudly. 'My name's Scorpius. I'm in your year at school. You might remember me from being my best friend.'

Emma laughed and ducked round to sit next to Scorpius on his side of the table, while Al and Lily rearranged themselves opposite. 'Nice to see you, Malfoy.'

He reached out to shake her hand; an inverse mockery of Al's enthusiastic hug. 'Spiffing to eyeball your facial configuration, Wells.'

'That was the most laboured joke of the night, Scorpius,' scolded Al.

'Joke? I haven't been joking tonight. I was completely serious when I said I'd shag you if you learned to tame your hair. Scruffy prick.'

'All the more reason to keep my artfully tousled locks, you ugly mank.'

'Artfully tousled my arse. That beast has taken control of your brain. It bloody _moves.'_

'Hi, Lily,' interrupted Emma.

'Hi Emma,' said Lily, long sufferingly. 'I forget, are you a stabilizing influence on these buffoons?'

'More of an invigorating force of beauty and wisdom. Doesn't have much effect on the goddamn swearing, though.'

'Amazing,' said Lily, shaking her head. 'I can have a perfectly sensible conversation with any one of you when you're alone, but put you together and you can't say _pass the potatoes _without cussing like sailors.'

'Bullshit,' said Scorpius.

'That's not fucking true,' argued Emma.

'I'm really fucking questioning your arsed up definition of a sensible conversation, as you thought it fucking appropriate to talk about wanking in front of me just this goddamn afternoon. You little shit.'

All three of them burst into laughter while Lily, the actual thirteen year old at the table, shook her head, lips twitching.

'Ladies and gentlemen – future Aurors and protectors of society right here.'

'You can't be an Auror without swearing,' said Al, with the air of someone saying something completely obvious to someone they suddenly pitied. 'No one's intimidated by a bloke who's scared to call a suspect the son of a whore.'

'How do you explain Dad, then?'

Emma grinned. 'Just because he doesn't swear in front of you lot doesn't mean he doesn't get raunchy round other people.' She raised an eyebrow jauntily to indicate that she was, indeed, talking about their mother. Lily scrunched up her nose and gagged as Al hit Emma over the head with a menu, sporting an expression of deepest betrayal.

'Uncalled for,' he accused. 'You've just traumatized Lily.'

Emma laughed. 'Lily's plenty traumatized already, what with you and James as brothers.'

'I'm a wonderful brother. I more than make up for James.'

'James gives me more money,' Lily intercepted.

'I set a better example.'

'Hmm.' Lily scratched her chin, intensely thoughtful. 'I could follow James and be a narcissistic, womanizing Quidditch junkie with a record for indecent exposure, or I could be like you – a chain smoking layabout with high cholesterol and sentient hair. I dunno, it's a tough call.'

Emma barked with laughter; Scorpius looked pleasantly surprised; Al muttered something about his hair.

'You are really ridiculously verbose for a thirteen year old,' Scorpius observed.

'It's all the wanking.'

Following his little sister's implication that she partook in masturbatory activities, Al went outside for a smoke.

Al, Emma and Scorpius had been best friends since their first year of Hogwarts. Emma and Scorpius – respectively a titchy little girl no-one had ever heard of from a Muggle foster home, and the sole inheritor of a name that inspired contempt and loathing in the minds of any witch or wizard old enough to hear stories about the war – had banded together immediately and squabbled like siblings ever since. Al's surname acted as a kind of talisman – gaining him superfluous friendship with anyone he spoke to and a pretty lonely time of it at first. He had earned their true and persevering loyalty when he happened to look upon the Marauder's Map one night, seen Scorpius and Emma boxed into the Restricted Section of the library by Filch, and sprinted down with the Invisibility Cloak to help them out (lucky thing he'd pilfered them both from James in the first of many times the brothers would steal the items from, and back from, one another).

He'd been caught almost as soon as he got to the library, about five seconds after Scorpius and Emma. The three of them were dragged in front of Silverbeech and threatened with an outlandish loss of house points and a month's worth of detention – the punishment was knocked down to twenty points each and a couple of week scrubbing the ceilings in the dungeons, when Professor Baubrey – their Defence teacher – argued their case. He'd claimed they had all been possessed by demons, and though Silverbeech obviously didn't believe a word of it, she had a soft spot for Baubrey.

She let them go.

Though Al hadn't succeeded in saving them, they'd been absolutely bowled over that he tried. From that day on the three of them were inseparable.

'Well cut off my nose and call me Voldemort, you showed up,' said Al. 'Hey Braless.'

He'd known when he stepped outside into the now frigid late July evening that Emma would follow him. It was a tradition. Scorpius hated the smell of smoke and liked to perform an enthusiastic rendition of _Choking on Noxious Fumes While Performing A Jig _whenever he was subjected to it – the jig part of the performance was assumed to be incidental, as Scorpius seemed to believe that choking involved the violent and rhythmic twitching of the legs. He was often very shy about being seen to be deliberately funny – preferred to err on the side of witty remarks and cutting soliloquys, leaving physical comedy mostly alone – and so neither Al nor Emma had had the heart to poke any holes in his confidence. Nonetheless, it was a joke that could easily be worn out, and so Scorpius rarely accompanied Al outside.

Emma, on the other hand, had gotten her very first cigarette from Al and though she seemed to feel guilty about financing her own habit, she had no compunction about dipping into his supply.

Emma rolled her eyes – either at the Voldemort remark (he really had to pick his audience with those, because some people seemed to find it very inappropriate when a Potter made a Voldemort joke, never mind that his father heartily encouraged them) – or the 'Braless' – reference to her status as the very last Gryffindor girl to get herself into underwire, as made evident by an embarrassing incident in third year when she wound up upside down on a broom with her shirt over her head. Al, being a kind soul, had brought it up often to desensitize her to the humiliation.

'Hey,' she smiled, cheeks slightly flushed. 'Can I have a cig?'

'Aw, Ems,' he groaned. 'I feel bad. You always go without over the hols and then you see me again and start coating your chest with tar.'

'I was being polite. If you don't hand me one I'll just summon the box from your pocket.'

'Well in that case, go right on ahead and give yourself emphysema. Who am I to stop you.'

'Don't you want to be in an old folks home together, wheezing and coughing up our lungs till we die?'

'Picturesque as that prospect is, at this rate we won't make it to the old folks home. It'll be next Christmas.'

'And I reiterate: I quit when you quit.'

'Ah well. Only the good die young. And we both know I'll be the death of you one way or another,' he grinned. She took the proffered cigarette and lit up; within a few seconds she was blowing perfect smoke rings. Al had always envied her that ability. Give him a wand and he could give you smoke ships, smoke ballerinas, smoke elephants – but strip him down to cigarettes and even the ring, that most classic and simple of shapes, eluded him completely. Emma was a sporadic smoker, too – if anyone ought to have a mental block with the things, it should be her.

Emma looked good; and you never could tell with her. A summer away could produce a gaunt, raggedy, exhausted Emma who carefully avoided any and all questions about what she'd been up to; or it could bring forth a refreshed, bright-eyed version that he much preferred, who told stories about her foster siblings' mad antics with affection and openness. He got the feeling that the tone of her summers was fairly unpredictable, even to her – but there was obviously something good about them, because she always went home willingly.

Today he was glad to see the latter version. Her long, sleek dark hair was trimmed and brushed; brown eyes shining in that possum way she had; goofy grin constantly teasing her at her lips. She was thin, but she was always thin. She was thin on a diet of full English breakfasts and nightly puddings; if she started to get chubby, then he'd worry.

'Been having a good summer?' Al asked.

Emma shrugged. 'On the whole, yeah. Not too bad. Weather's been the pits, even for London, but what can you do.'

'Kids giving you trouble?

She laughed. 'You know that Greek myth about Zeus cutting off his bits and throwing them into the ocean, how they turned into Aphrodite? If you cut off a bit of Griggs or Erica and threw them into the ocean, you'd get the god and goddess of Trouble.'

'They sound brilliant,' Al said. 'I'd love to meet them one day.'

'One day,' she nodded. 'They'd adore you.'

'Well, who wouldn't. You been getting any time off work?'

'A bit – you know, when I can. I'm sorry, again, about the not writing. Muggle house, very busy – it's just a bit hard.'

'I know,' he reassured her. 'I just miss you is all.'

At this, she turned her gaze on him. Emma had weirdly transformative eyes. Sometimes they were just nice, brown parts of her face that told him if her smile was true or if she was happy, tired, hungry – if she was really okay with that thing he just said or pissed beyond belief. Other times they were completely clear of what she was thinking or feeling – a sky suddenly cleared of birds – and worked instead like a delicately phrased question, asked in exactly the way that could make a person sing. It made him nervous.

'How's it been with James?' she asked carefully.

He had been trying not to think about James. That is, the part of James – last year's incident involving James – that she was talking about. But those goddamn eyes. They cracked him open.

'It's been… okay,' he said slowly.

Scepticism lifted her brow.

'No, really,' he added hastily. 'I mean, we're not hunky dory, best buds, making up secret handshakes… but when were we ever?'

'He hasn't said anything about it?'

'Merlin no,' Al shook his head. 'I think he honestly regrets it, you know… and when James wants to take something back, he just pretends it never happened. Expecting him to bring it up or apologize… it'd be like asking a pig to fly. He just can't.'

'You sound awfully accepting of that.'

'If I went about trying to change James or getting upset when he acts like a prick, I'd never have any peace. It's just easier to accept his limitations.' He tried to sound casual about this – like he didn't really care – but a tinge of bitterness slipped through. Because, of course, he did care. Hadn't yet managed to cure himself of that.

'Easier, yeah.' Her words held all the trappings of agreement but something in her voice made Al think she didn't really agree with him at all.

Emma was great at advice. She often knew him better than he knew himself and on a lot of things, he was willing to trust her opinion over his own. James, however, was a case unto himself. Only through years of living with him could a person hope to understand the sheer terror of beginning to unravel his psyche or the tangled mess that was their relationship; the only one who could possibly empathise was Lily, but being a girl she'd had to endure rather a lot less competitive macho bullshit and been privy to a lot more elder-brother protectiveness and gentility.

They lapsed into silence. Not an uncomfortable one; Al knew Emma wasn't challenging him – she was just worried. And Emma knew Al was okay really. This was the warm, almost sleepy silence of two people who were glad enough to see each other that they didn't really need to talk; it was nice just to stand and watch Emma's smoke rings and Al's misshapen attempts at them dissolve into the air.

Something was different about this year. He couldn't put his finger on what it was, but he knew it was the source of his heightened anxiety this summer about being away from school, about being away from his friends. He had this nagging sense that something was off. If he was asked to describe it he'd have to say it sounded something like his parents' worried voices melting through the ceiling at late hours of the night – he'd not been able to understand what they were saying, but he could practically taste the worry. It felt something like Lily suddenly not being allowed to go into Hogsmeade on her own, when she always had before. It was brought to mind by Teddy's exhausted expression and people huddling against the cold in the streets – it was a lot of things. Al didn't know whether or not to trust it, but he couldn't help the knot in his stomach that came when he read Scorpius's letter delaying his trip to come stay; when that scrap of paper came from Emma, telling him in so many words that he wouldn't be able to check on her for months.

He took a sidelong glance at her. They weren't the soppy type, he and Emma – though certainly more so than he and Scorpius – and yet looking at her, leaning against the front of The Three Broomsticks in that threadbare blue top – why the woman refused to wear a bra, he could not fathom - he wanted to say something stupid like _You know you can count on me, right? _

Al was just opening his mouth so say something – he could feel the urge swinging up from his gut into his mouth and felt a prickle of foreboding, because he hadn't planned it at all – when Emma's eyes, which had been hazy with relaxation a second ago, focussed on something in the near distance and he looked round to see what it was.

'Oh Krupp on a cracker,' he gaped – and all thoughts of saying something mushy to Emma disappeared, because miracle of miracles, Meredith Rothfuss was here. Object of his lust, apple of his eye, breaker of his heart – she was bloody gorgeous and she made Al's mouth go dry in two seconds flat even when she was wearing her school kit – and she was not, tonight, wearing her school kit. Meredith Rothfuss – auburn haired, blue eyed, bee-stung lipped goddess – was wearing a lacy black top that was really more an _allusion _to clothes than it was an actual physical representation of them; a pair of jeans that made her legs look utterly illegal; and a set of what Rose referred to derisively (and what Al would refer to from this point on in a tone of worship) as _fuck me pumps. _

'Merlin strike me down, I didn't even fucking shave,' Al hissed, because it was pretty damn evident that Meredith Rothfuss was walking towards The Three Broomsticks and that she'd probably go inside and he, Al, could not be missed in that process. The fact that Meredith Rothfuss had ceased to be polite to him sometime round fourth year and was now in a stage of barely disguised finding-him-annoying was not important.

He turned, wide-eyed, to Emma – who was used to his Meredith Rothfuss induced meltdowns and was stamping her cigarette out with her heel, looking a bit irritated. He grabbed her arm.

'Ow!'

'Do a shaving charm on me.'

'I will not!'

'Come on, I look like Hagrid.'

'Ha, you wish you could grow a beard like Hagrid.'

'Emma. My wise and trustworthy friend. Help me out.'

He could practically see the moment she threw sensibility to the wind and decided to help him – not seeming thrilled about it, mind you, but not ticked off enough to take advantage of his permission for her to shave his face and slash his jugular instead.

'Fine,' she sighed, getting her wand out from the waistband of her jeans. 'Hold still, will you –'

She never finished her sentence, because at that moment the honey-tinted windows of The Three Broomsticks exploded outward in a cloud of broken glass, black smoke and roaring green flame.

**AN: Hello and thank you for reading (hopefully at least someone did)! I'm a bit nervous about this one. It's is going to be a fairly long Next Generation story focussing mainly on the friendship of Al, Scorpius and Emma, along with most if not all of the characters mentioned on JK Rowling's next gen family tree; heavily featuring the Potter family and a few of the favourite Weasleys. Other characters from the books will pop up with regularity. It's the story of war re-emerging in the wizarding world (as war always does) as my protagonists, Al and Emma, find their relationship with each other and certain other people changing in ways they would not expect… I hope you like it!**

**I've already gotten some of this written, but to keep updates fairly regularly spaced out I've got to say it'll probably be a fortnightly deal – on average – can't promise. I'll do my best.**

**I'd really, really love to hear what you think of it – anything at all – drop me a line . **


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